The Structure and Affinities of Peranema and 
Diacalpe. 
BY 
R. C. DAVIE, M.A., B.Sc. 
Robert Donaldson Research Scholar of Glasgow University , Assistant in Botany in the 
University of Edinburgh % 
With Plates XXVIII and XXIX. 
Tf)E RA NE M A CYATHEOIDES, D. Don, was first collected in the 
^ mountains of Nepal, Sheopore, and Chandagiri by Wallich. It was 
included in his ‘Plantae Asiaticae Rarae ’,and was sent in 1823 to the Honour- 
able East India Company’s Museum at the India House. Duplicates were 
most liberally distributed in May of the following year. One of these is 
in the Herbarium of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. On this specimen, 
however, there is only a written label, bearing the name Sphaeropteris 
barbata , Wall. There is no description of the plant, not even a note of its 
marked characteristics. Wallich’s description was not published until 1830, 
when his ‘ Plantae Asiaticae Rarae ’ was issued. Meanwhile, David Don, in 
1825, had published the ‘Prodromus Florae Nepalensis ’ and had described 
Sphaeropteris , though in no great detail, under the name of Peranema 
cyathoides. Thus on the basis of priority of publication, as the label 
on Wallich’s specimen is not printed but written, the name of the Fern must 
be kept as Peranema . Hooker and Baker in the ‘ Synopsis Filicum ’ give 
the specific name as Peranema cyatheoides , D. Don. This is also done by 
Christ in ‘ Die Farnkrauter der Erde ’, and by Christensen in the ‘ Index 
Filicum It is, however, more accurate to retain this specific name than to 
revert to Don’s own ‘ cyathoides ’. 
It is included by Presl in his ‘Tentamen Pteridographiae ’ (1836), 
where it is placed with Physematium , Kaulf., Thyrsopteris , Kze., and 
Cibotinm , Kaulf., in the Peranemeae, the first tribe of the Hymenophoreae, 
Cohort I of the sub-order Cathetogyratae, Bernhardi. This tribe immediately 
follows the Cyatheaceae and precedes the Aspidiaceae. In 1842 it was 
included in J. Smith’s ‘ Genera of Ferns’ in Hooker’s ‘ Journal of Botany ’, 
vql. iv, p. 190. There it is placed in Section II of the Aspidieae, — the 
Orthophlebieae — a section characterized by their free venation, none of the 
[Annals of Botany, Vol. XXVI. No. CXI. April, 191a.] 
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